The statue of Thomas Jefferson on the Tidal Basin in Washington gets a wash in this file photo. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

(Newser)
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Democrats in Iowa last weekend officially ditched the name of their annual Jefferson-Jackson Dinner, a move that's part of a larger trend taking place around the country, reports CNN. While the party has long celebrated Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson at such dinners, the pair's own slave-owning history is finally taking a toll. Jackson's role in driving Native Americans out of the southeastern US—the "Trail of Tears"—also is a factor. Democrats in Georgia, Connecticut, Missouri, Maine, New Hampshire, and other states have scrapped their Jefferson-Jackson affairs or are considering doing so.

In Iowa, a Democratic leader said it's all about making sure the party lives up to the values of "inclusiveness, diversity, and equality." The New York Times also has taken notice: Controversy over the Confederate flag may be generating bigger headlines, its story observes, but the efforts by Democrats "to remove Jefferson and Jackson from their official identity underscore one of the most consequential trends of American politics: Democrats’ shift from a union-powered party organized primarily around economic solidarity to one shaped by racial and sexual identity."

Jefferson might not have been the poster child for anti-slavery reasoning, yet his contribution to the founding of the United States can't be overlooked and nor minimized by way of what it was acceptable, although he thought of it as immoral, at the time. Although he believed that slavery was against the laws of nature he still maintained ownership of a significant number of slaves. But to his credit it should be noted that he free some of them. Again, the man should still be honor for the good he did that in many ways contributed to their emancipation. They should have that dinner. Sincerely, Truesoy

Lefty_Libby

Aug 12, 2015 12:41 PM CDT

I can see continuing to celebrate one of our Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson, but Andrew Jackson was a monster.

DtAL

Aug 12, 2015 12:03 PM CDT

Given how far today's dimocraps have strayed from the 'obsolete' concepts of honor, industry, honesty, truth, integrity, personal responsibility and such, it would be a given the primary author of the Declaration of Independence and our Constitution, the most brilliant President in our history, Thomas Jefferson, would abandon *them* while Old Hickory would simply tell them to take their cowardly skanky butts out of his sight & hearing. The heroes of this crowd are Marx, Lenin & Quisling.